On May 28th 2016, a child fell into the gorilla enclosure at the Cincinnati Zoo.
When Harambe the gorilla picked the child up, the zoo workers felt they had no other choice but to shoot Harmabe in order to save the child's life.
It was pretty disturbing to witness an innocent animal full on murdered rather than simply tranquilized.
Innocent animals are hunted and killed for sport every day, but for some reason, we all felt like this death was different. That Harambe himself was different.
We didn't just lose a gorilla—we lost a piece of ourselves that day too.
Someone who lived as the physical manifestation of truth and wisdom on earth.
Someone who's loss shook us to our very core, and left us asking the big questions: What really matters? Who do we want to be in this life? Why are we so upset about a gorilla?
He's part meme, part cathartic method of escapism, part deconstruction of collective mourning culture.
Harambe forces us to examine the ways in which we attribute meaning to subjects whom we've arbitrarily attributed meaning. In this essay I will...
And they've been out in solidarity for three years straight.
Do you feel old yet? I sure do.
Though Harmabe is gone from this earth, his spirit lives on through the collective Millennial cry for justice.
Rest in peace Harambe. Rest in peace.
h/t: Twitter
